How do I get this to work? Need to play Atari 2600 on modern digital TV...

AtariSphinx · April 13, 2022

2 hours ago, Nathan Strum said:

To each their own, but for RF, I've found the Sony tuner plus a good quality cable to give the best results.

I can definitely confirm the quality of the tuner makes a huge difference with RF. I normally use a Sony CRT TV (Sony tuner) with a non modded RF connected 2600 and it looks great.

Just for experimentation I tried using a late model Toshiba VCR (that has both a digital and analog tuner) with the same TV and Atari to do the RF to composite conversion resulted in worse results. Keeping everything the same and using an earlier/older Toshiba VCR (only analog tuner) and the results looked the same as the direct to Sony TV tuner results.

I would like to try one of those tuner only ones mentioned by Nathan to see how it compares to my Sony TV tuner.

The other thing that makes a huge difference with RF is using ferrite beads such as these near the tuner end connection. They really cut down on interference.

With RF it definitely requires some work/right equipment to get it to look good versus modding but I think it is worth it if you want to keep your system original or cannot mod it.

Edited April 13, 2022 by AtariSphinx
Updated wording

12,618 posts · April 13, 2022

I have one of these and the picture is great on my 4k tcl series 4 tv from 2019.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/304423514344?hash=item46e10e30e8:g:BNkAAOSwm6ZiR3-L

tripled79 · April 14, 2022

On 4/12/2022 at 10:17 PM, 0078265317 said:

Atari 2600 is mono only so what does it matter?

I thought there were some Stereo Atari 2600 games...

+Nathan Strum · April 14, 2022

1 hour ago, tripled79 said:

I thought there were some Stereo Atari 2600 games...

Some games were designed to use the two audio channels for a stereo effect, but stereo output was never implemented in the 2600 so you won't hear it. Stereo TV wasn't a thing in 1977. Originally, the 2600 was going to have two built-in speakers for that.

You can hear the stereo effect in emulation, or if you mod a 2600 so each of its audio channels goes to a separate output. But a stock 2600 itself cannot output stereo.

tripled79 · April 15, 2022

20 hours ago, Nathan Strum said:

Some games were designed to use the two audio channels for a stereo effect, but stereo output was never implemented in the 2600 so you won't hear it. Stereo TV wasn't a thing in 1977. Originally, the 2600 was going to have two built-in speakers for that.

You can hear the stereo effect in emulation, or if you mod a 2600 so each of its audio channels goes to a separate output. But a stock 2600 itself cannot output stereo.

Ah. I modded my 2600 so that is why I am getting Stereo sound out.

orange808 · April 15, 2022

Nah. You wasted your money on that tuner. Get a VCR. Your tuner appears to be a model for boats and recreational vehicles. The main design priority for those involves limiting illegal signal emissions, not picture quality or noise reduction.

VCR's were designed for frequent viewing in the home. In that environment, video quality matters. It's also where interference and noise was most likely. You are overthinking this entire thing.

Professional tuners are going to be rack-mountable gear from a broadcast or closed circuit environment (although there are lots of them from legacy security systems floating around). Regardless, I have one and it doesn't outperform a nice VCR. If anything, a VCR is often better at noise reduction than some pro gear, anyway.

I also have an Extron tuner meant for closed circuit installations, it also falls short of a VCR. Truthfully, nobody in the "business" and conference segment cares much for overall quality, it's really about durable machines that get something on the screen with minimum thought.

People watched television and recorded television from the tuners in their VCRs. The tuners were a huge priority. Video quality was king for consumer VCRs. Don't overthink it. Get a nice VCR.

You'll find that noise reduction is more important than ever, because the television signal bandwidth is no longer reserved for television signals.

Edited April 15, 2022 by orange808

+wongojack · April 15, 2022

There are TONS of threads on this already on these forums, so search is your friend. The discussion about a tuner is helpful, but if searching ebay, look for RF demodulators (not modulators). "Blonder Tongue" is a company that made them for broadcast equipment, and they can usually be found on ebay very easily.

orange808 · April 15, 2022

I have Blonder Tongue and MediaTek rack tuners. I have the Sony unit in the thread. I have an Extron closed circuit.

Get yourself a VCR. ?

Edited April 15, 2022 by orange808

+wongojack · April 15, 2022

19 minutes ago, orange808 said:

I have Blonder Tongue and a MediaTek rack tuners. I have the Sony unit in the thread. I have an Extron closed circuit.

Get yourself a VCR.

Yeah, I have 3 or so of these myself, and I've, of course, used a VCR. If you can find a VCR easily sure, but you almost have to come across them organically for it to be worth it. In my experience working VCRs are more than I want to spend (for this purpose) which is what led me to de-modulators. I find the video output quality to be the same. If you are worried about quality, you should get a CRT TV.

Plus, the de-modulators come in various sizes which are usually smaller than a VCR and definitely not as heavy which is important if you need to ship it.

orange808 · April 15, 2022

That's the thing. Most VCRs are discarded or branded "not working" because equipment related to handling and playing back tapes had failed. The tuners are durable and most discarded VCR units will be fine. Often, people will give you a broken one for free.

Regardless, I spent the time and money examining the options and my game room is rather "noisy" (from both power and interference). While others are welcome to invest their own time and money investigating (and your milage may vary), I found a VCR still works best. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

As for CRTs, you're right. A nice CRT consumer television will usually instantly deliver an instant clean looking signal with a direct connection to the Atari. That's my preferred method--especially for the 7800, because the mods don't really deliver dependably proper colors (or not the last time I looked into it, maybe that has been solved).

+wongojack · April 15, 2022

On 4/12/2022 at 10:36 PM, 0078265317 said:

Or instead of ebay buy locally so you can return it if needed.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Ematic-ATSC-Digital-Converter-Box-AT103B/300817320

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Mediasonic-HOMEWORX-Digital-Converter-Box-Compact-Edition-with-TV-Tuner-Recording-Media-Player-Flat-Antenna-and-HDMI-Cable-HW135STBA/308316799

These are meant to accept the input from an HD antenna (the second one comes with one) which sends a digital signal and not analog. They take a digital broadcast signal and give you a way to output it to a display. This is the opposite problem than our OP. This would be for someone who doesn't have a digital tuner (and needs one). The OP has a digital tuner but needs an analog tuner instead. I would want to see some product specs that say they convert an NTSC analog signal before buying. Everything I see mentions ATSC or a digital signal which is not what is produced by the Atari.

orange808 · April 15, 2022

Also, don't over engineer your solution. Many people think they want component output from one of the later DVD recorder units. You actually don't want that, because the comsumer products that did that perform poorly for video games. (At least the ones I own or owned in the past.)

Those recorder machines add **a lot of** latency and most also insist on converting all signals to "true" proper 480i interlaced video. It looks bad. Even worse, playing games on my DVD recorders has so much latency, it's actually.(sort of) interesting to see how long I can play a game without dying. When you can see and feel the delay, you know it's ridiculous. That huge processing time provides excellent comb filtering results (good for laserdisks), but the delay is unsuitable for video games. I never found a "component out" consumer "VCR" that didn't perform slow digital processing.

Don't overthink it. Just get a regular old VCR.

P.S. Don't bother trying to find a "fast" high quality video game friendly comb filter. It doesn't exist. High quality comb filters work by using a frame buffer. It's possible a community developed video scaler may someday offer a custom comb filtering solution, but it hasn't happened yet. I've been down that rabbit hole and I didn't find anything.

Edited April 15, 2022 by orange808

12,618 posts · April 15, 2022

1 hour ago, orange808 said:

Also, don't over engineer your solution. Many people think they want component output from one of the later DVD recorder units. You actually don't want that, because the comsumer products that did that perform poorly for video games. (At least the ones I own or owned in the past.)

Those recorder machines add **a lot of** latency and most also insist on converting all signals to "true" proper 480i interlaced video. It looks bad. Even worse, playing games on my DVD recorders has so much latency, it's actually.(sort of) interesting to see how long I can play a game without dying. When you can see and feel the delay, you know it's ridiculous. That huge processing time provides excellent comb filtering results (good for laserdisks), but the delay is unsuitable for video games. I never found a "component out" consumer "VCR" that didn't perform slow digital processing.

Don't overthink it. Just get a regular old VCR.

P.S. Don't bother trying to find a "fast" high quality video game friendly comb filter. It doesn't exist. High quality comb filters work by using a frame buffer. It's possible a community developed video scaler may someday offer a custom comb filtering solution, but it hasn't happened yet. I've been down that rabbit hole and I didn't find anything.

I have a govideo dv2140 vcr and dvd (non recorder just plain dvd playback) combo. It has component but not sure if its input or output. And it is for the dvd side only probably.

Edited April 15, 2022 by 0078265317

froggerchamp · April 22, 2022

On 4/12/2022 at 7:30 PM, Nathan Strum said:

You don't need the remote. Once you set it to channel 3 using the buttons on the front of the tuner, you'll never need to touch it again.

Otherwise, just a power cable, an RCA to RF adapter (if using the stock Atari RF cable) to go from the 2600 into the tuner, some RCA cables to go from the tuner to the TV and an RCA to BNC adapter, since the video-out on the tuner is actually a BNC connector.

Hey, found a Sony tuner (TU-1041U)....followed all your links to the Amazon listings; thanks!!

So, wondering: you said "some RCA cables to go from the tuner to the TV"....so, you said "cables" (plural).....

Should I get more than one RCA cable you show at that link? IF so, how many?

+Nathan Strum · April 22, 2022

Well, it's one "cable" but it's actually made up of three cables (2 audio + video). You just need the one "cable", but I always buy more than I need so I have spares.

froggerchamp · April 28, 2022

On 4/22/2022 at 12:47 PM, Nathan Strum said:

Well, it's one "cable" but it's actually made up of three cables (2 audio + video). You just need the one "cable", but I always buy more than I need so I have spares.

Thanks -- I have two of those "one cable made up of three" now, as a safeguard. Appreciate the idea.

So I've now compiled instructions, as best I can, and bought all the connectors you recommended. I will be setting it up today, and hope that everything I bought works...as today is when I get to play Atari again (crossing fingers).....

I have written out instructions for myself, to get this done; laid these instructions out as clearly as I possibly can...and hope that I got this right. If not, please let me know!

Here goes!

Instructions for playing a stock, unmodified Atari 2600 on a modern digital TV.

Steps include how to plug the 2600's stock RF cable into the Sony TU-1041U tuner. And, for plugging the Sony TU-1041U tuner into composite-in + audio on your TV.

1.) One RCA to RF adapter: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08BYD8GV4/

Connect 1 RCA to RF adapter to the end of the stock Atari RF cable. Then attach that stock Atari cable to the Sony TU-1041U tuner.

2.) One RCA cable: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B077GR49P9/

Attach 1 RCA cable to go from the Sony TU-1041U tuner to the TV. Note: it is good to have an extra on hand, so it is recommended to buy two of these, in case one fails in the future.

3.) Three RCA to BNC adapters: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07PHK4FBM/

Attach 3 RCA to BNC adapters to the ends of the RCA cable, since the video-out on the Sony TU-1041U tuner is actually a BNC connector.

4.) Adjustments. After you plugged the Sony TU-1041U tuner into composite-in + audio on your TV, you will need to let the TV do the scaling. Turn off any aspect ratio stretching (the 2600 was not 16:9), turn off frame interpolation (it can make 2600 graphics look wonky) and put the TV in Game mode for the fastest response time.

5.) Channel. Set it to 'Channel 3' using the buttons on the front of the Sony TU-1041U tuner; you'll never need to touch it again.

---

So, Nathan Strum....did I get it right? Hope so! I am spitballing it for the number of 'RCA to BNC adapters' part....I assume I'll be needing 3 there...that is the one part of the instructions I gathered from your responses that I was most unclear on. Is using 3 correct?

Thanks again for all your help!!

+wongojack · April 28, 2022

I'm not Nathan, but it all looks right to me. You are in a bit of a unique situation that you want this to be a gift and can't test it specifically before delivering it, but I would recommend you go through some type of test to make sure it is all working as you expect. Some gotchas that I see might be the M(ale) vs F(emale) orientation of the adapters.

Regarding the number of RCA to BNC adapters, it depends on what the Sony TU-1041U tuner outputs. The audio coming from the 2600 will be mono which means it would not require a R and L (usually Red and White) split of the 3 ended cable, but if TU-1041U has 3 outputs then it won't hurt anything to connect all 3 of them to adapters and then to the TV via the cable. The worst thing that would happen would be only one of the audio lines is actually carrying sound.

+Nathan Strum · April 28, 2022

5 hours ago, froggerchamp said:

I have written out instructions for myself, to get this done; laid these instructions out as clearly as I possibly can...and hope that I got this right. If not, please let me know!

Here goes!

I'll try to take some pics of my setup when I get home from work tonight. But in the meantime...

5 hours ago, froggerchamp said:

1.) One RCA to RF adapter: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08BYD8GV4/

Connect 1 RCA to RF adapter to the end of the stock Atari RF cable. Then attach that stock Atari cable to the Sony TU-1041U tuner.

Yep.

5 hours ago, froggerchamp said:

2.) One RCA cable: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B077GR49P9/

Attach 1 RCA cable to go from the Sony TU-1041U tuner to the TV. Note: it is good to have an extra on hand, so it is recommended to buy two of these, in case one fails in the future.

3.) Three RCA to BNC adapters: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07PHK4FBM/

Attach 3 RCA to BNC adapters to the ends of the RCA cable, since the video-out on the Sony TU-1041U tuner is actually a BNC connector.

You only need one adapter. The connectors on the back of the tuner are:

BNC - video

RCA (x 2) - left and right audio

So you're only adapting one of the RCA connectors to BNC.

5 hours ago, froggerchamp said:

4.) Adjustments. After you plugged the Sony TU-1041U tuner into composite-in + audio on your TV, you will need to let the TV do the scaling. Turn off any aspect ratio stretching (the 2600 was not 16:9), turn off frame interpolation (it can make 2600 graphics look wonky) and put the TV in Game mode for the fastest response time.

Yep.

5 hours ago, froggerchamp said:

5.) Channel. Set it to 'Channel 3' using the buttons on the front of the Sony TU-1041U tuner; you'll never need to touch it again.

If the 2600 has a channel select switch on the underside, make sure it's set to Channel 3 (if you can't tell, flip it back and forth until you get a picture).

- Nathan

+Nathan Strum · April 28, 2022

On 4/28/2022 at 10:25 AM, wongojack said:

I'm not Nathan, but it all looks right to me. You are in a bit of a unique situation that you want this to be a gift and can't test it specifically before delivering it, but I would recommend you go through some type of test to make sure it is all working as you expect. Some gotchas that I see might be the M(ale) vs F(emale) orientation of the adapters.

I'd definitely try this out before handing it off to someone else. This setup should work on any TV that has composite+audio inputs, so testing should not be difficult.

Quote

Regarding the number of RCA to BNC adapters, it depends on what the Sony TU-1041U tuner outputs. The audio coming from the 2600 will be mono which means it would not require a R and L (usually Red and White) split of the 3 ended cable, but if TU-1041U has 3 outputs then it won't hurt anything to connect all 3 of them to adapters and then to the TV via the cable. The worst thing that would happen would be only one of the audio lines is actually carrying sound.

The tuner takes mono in from RF and splits it to left and right. It's not stereo, but sound will come out of both TV speakers. Mono sound coming out of one speaker on a stereo TV always sounds "broken" to me, even if it's technically correct.

Edited April 29, 2022 by Nathan Strum
testing should "not" be difficult.

+Nathan Strum · April 29, 2022

Here's the back of my tuner - the BNC adapter is sitting in front of it on the left, the RF adapter on the right:

With adapters connected - the BNC twists and locks into place with a 'click', the RF screws on:

With the cables plugged in - yellow, white, red are video, audio left and audio right out to the TV; the fourth cable on the far right is the stock RF cable coming from the 2600:

Note: if you use the stock RF cable, you're likely to pick up noise from interference. You can reduce this following some of the suggestions in my blog entry (bundling up excess cables, moving the RF cable away from power cords, etc).

This shows the tuner with the replacement RF cable I installed in this blog entry:

Hope it all works for you!

How do I get this to work? Need to play Atari 2600 on modern digital TV...

Recommended Posts

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Join the conversation

Recently Browsing 0 members